


what falls from the skies

by dhils



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Gardens & Gardening, M/M, Superstition, multigrain vegan paraben-free fertilizer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2020-05-01 22:23:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19186549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dhils/pseuds/dhils
Summary: “We technically have joint custody of a flower."





	what falls from the skies

**Author's Note:**

> i am perfectly willing to overdose on loving baby bruins juice, as it turns out

Charlie’s hair is wet and sticking to his forehead when he stumbles into their hotel room. There’s a glass jar in his hands.

Jake wants to complain, because he’s soaking the entire place in rainwater like a too-excited wet dog running in after sprawling around in puddles. Except here it’s Charlie and Charlie doesn’t listen to commands. 

Jake could firmly tell him to _sit_ and then probably get a wet sock thrown at his head, so he keeps his mouth shut. It doesn’t mean he’s not glaring. 

“I haven’t even said anything yet,” Charlie protests. Not at all rightfully, because the trail of water he’s leaving behind himself speaks volumes. 

“You don’t need to, I already hate you, you win,” Jake says. He tries not to lurch back when Charlie takes a step towards his bed, but that’s too much rainwater too close to his sheets. “Dude.”

“No, look,” Charlie lifts the jar, like Jake’s supposed to be enchanted by it. It’s half full of rainwater. 

“Nice, good work,” he says, unimpressed. “Isn’t that illegal? Like, you’re stealing from mother nature.”

“What?” Charlie shakes his head slowly. “That is—no, that’s not how that works at all. It’s good luck. Big blow out win on a rainy night, I’m watering something with this.” 

He sets the jar down on a countertop, right next to the TV, because Charlie is nothing if he isn’t bad ideas and impulse decisions. 

Jake blinks at him. “You don’t even have any plants.” 

“I’ll get a plant. One plant,” he explains. 

“Good, nobody trusts you with more than one anyways.” 

Charlie rolls his eyes. Outside, thunder crackles hard enough to make the walls shiver.

Jake says, “I’m gonna go get you a towel,” and scrambles out of bed.

 

 

Jake’s mother always tells him the same story when they pass by a patch of weeds in the grass. She tells him, with a faint smile playing on her lips, about the time he stepped on a dandelion walking home from one of his peewee games. 

Supposedly, he dropped his bag right there and started crying his eyes out. 

Supposedly, he asked her if he could tape the stem back into place.

Supposedly, he carried the sad little dandelion all the way back home and cared for it like a pet until it dried up and wilted. 

Jake can never find it in him to actually be able to pull that memory out. Part of him believes she’s confusing him for Jordyn, the other part doesn’t think it ever really happened. But it’s nice to think about. 

 

 

Charlie buys marigold seeds. 

The packet shows off a beauty shot of healthy yellow marigolds, and Jake doubts his flower is going to look anywhere near that by the time it blooms, but he knows Charlie means well. 

He watches him sow the seeds, then have a mini fit over forgetting to dampen the soil, and then try it all over again. It’s a process and a half just to plant them. He can’t imagine how the rest of this is going to go. 

“Two green thumbs, huh, buddy,” Jake offers, to a little grumble from Charlie, because hearing that in the most mocking tone Jake can muster probably isn’t what he wanted. It’s not high praise, but he’s working on it.

Charlie sets his pot on his window sill. It looks sad, full of nothing but dirt. 

Jake watches him twist his mouth to the side and google how long this is going to take.

 

 

Charlie texts him two days later, whatever it is he’s trying to say hidden within a string of exclamation points. Jake doesn’t read all of it because he doesn’t think half the messages are anything that even closely resembles english. 

The most recent text is _who waters mari when we’re out of town!!!!!??????_

That still makes no sense.

Jake stares at his phone for a second, two seconds. Slowly, he types back _what is mari_

_my marigold. it has a NAME u piece of shit. what r u? plantist??_ Charlie sends, with maybe half a second’s delay. _do u think i can get a plant sitter?? what if it dries out? what if it thinks im a bad caregiver???_

Jake was pretty sure plants didn’t think to begin with, but he was apparently very, very wrong and has everything to learn about gardening. 

_no u water it and then leave_ he texts, and turns his phone off. 

A minute later, it rings. 

Charlie says, “you’re a monster,” all horrified, and Jake isn’t even sure whether or not to be affronted.

“Go ask someone who knows about gardening, I can’t help you,” Jake tells him. “I didn’t force you to adopt a flower.” 

“You could at least pretend to care about it.” Charlie sounds scandalized. “Do you think if I said nice things to it or something it would forgive me by the time we got back from our roady?” 

Jake imagines Charlie’s really stumped over this, if he’s going far enough to risk golden blackmail material just to ask for Jake’s opinion on plant care. 

He sighs, defeated. 

“I do care about it,” he says. “Yes, yeah, I think it’ll forgive you. Maybe it’ll even surprise you with a welcome home party with all its other plant buddies. Positive energy.”

“Okay,” Charlie says, and he pauses. Thoughtfully. “Okay, you’re probably right.”

Jake scoffs, but he doesn’t hang up.

 

 

He gets a progress snap of Charlie’s marigold every now and then. Something quick while Charlie’s running out of the house, or a picture where he’s smiling next to it, and Jake’s still got the screenshot of the little sprout with _mari <3_ stuck to its pot on a sticky note. 

Jake smiles thinking about it, about how much Charlie’s grown to care about it, and he feels like he’s being pulled into the experience. Especially with how Charlie won’t stop talking about it, how proud he is that it hasn’t wilted. It could very well be that. The updates and the constant chatter like Charlie’s a proud father.

Whatever it is, Jake doesn’t chirp him when he says he wishes there was a flower daycare.

 

 

It rains the night they beat the Senators.

They play at home, so Jake doesn’t have to clean up after Charlie while he runs in and out of their hotel room, but he _does_ cringe while watching Charlie leave a trail of droplets down his hallway. The rainwater in his mason jar swishes with every step he takes. 

“It’s fresh so it’s, like, double points,” Charlie says. Jake isn’t sure if he’s talking to him or his marigold. 

“Is that how this works?” Jake watches him painstakingly screw the cap of his jar back on. He slides it into the same drawer as his ties. 

Charlie says, “if you believe hard enough,” and it could be a joke, but he doesn’t tell it like one. Jake huffs out a little laugh anyways. 

 

 

A hand shows up on his shoulder. It’s warm weight, not heavy, but pleasant. He’s too tired to crack his eyes open or form actual words with his lips, but he acknowledges it with a hum and wishes he could turn over in an airplane seat. 

“Hey, Jake,” Charlie says, his voice soft. Then, “I know you’re not asleep, you giant piece of shit,” still gentle

“I could’ve been,” Jake protests, but he doesn’t drag it out, prying an eye open just to meet Charlie’s gaze. 

The look on his face is this muted version of excitement, something with rounded corners. His hair is mussed up, and there’s a mark on his cheek from leaning against the side of the plane. Jake wants to reach out and touch. He doesn’t know what exactly he’d do when he got to that point, but he knows his fingers curl into themselves just to avoid doing something embarrassing.

“I have a good feeling about tonight,” Charlie says, nothing but hope pouring into his voice. “You know why?” 

Jake tries not to smile. “No, I don’t know why.” 

“I think Mari might actually be good luck,” he says, sounding very sure of himself. 

“You think so?” 

“I do.” 

Jake pats Charlie’s leg and retracts his fingers like they’d never ventured that far in the first place. Warmth spreads all through his hand. “Then maybe Mari is good luck.” 

 

 

After a while, Jake stops picking on Charlie for caring for Mari like a pet. He goes as far as actually calling it Mari around him, because Charlie insists a kind environment is all apart of the growing process.

It hasn’t bloomed yet. Jake has never stuck his head far enough into gardening to know exactly when it’s due to bloom, but something in him feels guilty whenever he sees Charlie disappointed about it.

“The site said eight weeks,” he says, staring down at his skates. He’s laced them up three times already, always untying them, redoing them. It’s a nervous tick. 

Jake wants to reach out and still his hand. He doesn’t, but he thinks about it.

“Maybe you’ve got a late bloomer,” he offers, because he’s at the point where he’s consoling his best friend about his plant. And fuck it, what if he is. “All plants are unique, y’know. You ever hear someone say no two snowflakes are made the same?”

“It’s a marigold, Jake, not a snowflake,” Charlie says. 

“I know that.” 

Charlie looks like he’s going to untie his skates again, but Jake adds, “hey, you’re doing really great, okay? You have nothing to worry about. Seriously.“ 

Charlie sucks his bottom lip into his mouth and Jake tries not to stare for much longer after he feels his chest tighten. Even then, his cheeks burn like he’s standing directly over flames. The locker room lighting is harsh, but he couldn’t get away with throwing the blame that way. 

“Thanks, man,” Charlie says, with this quiet smile. It feels weirdly personal. 

Jake doesn’t think about how odd this is. He doesn’t think about Charlie worrying over a tiny potted plant. But he can admit he thinks about the crinkle of joy in the corners of Charlie’s eyes. He can admit he thinks about that a lot for the rest of the day. 

 

 

“Guess what,” Charlie all but screams at Jake from the other side of a facetime call. 

It’s 3 AM, the collar of his shirt is askew, and the camera is grainy in the dull lighting of his room. He looks beautiful. 

Jake tries blinking the tiredness out of his eyes while he sits up in bed. “If you don’t flip this camera around to show me the goddamn fountain of youth we are no longer friends,” he says, his voice thick in his throat with sleep. 

“No, no, listen, it’s better,” Charlie insists. The grin practically cracking his face in two is heavily in his favour. It’s too much this late into the night. “I got outta bed for a drink of water, right.”

“This is wildly interesting, thank you for waking me up.” 

“ _Jake_. When I turned on the lights—“ He flips the camera around, and it takes a moment for Jake’s slow as molasses AM brain to catch up, but. 

On the other end of the camera, Charlie’s marigold—fucking Mari—has bloomed just enough for the yellow petals to be visible. It hasn’t burst open quite yet, but the yellow is bright, bright, bright, and Jake can’t help that quiet affection that bubbles up in his chest. 

He’s smiling before he knows it. He doubts Charlie’s looking, not with the frail lamplight on his own end and the long awaited bloom of his flower, but Jake‘s silently proud. 

“That’s, like, woah,” he says, which is apparently enough, because Charlie makes an excited noise of agreement. 

“I know! I _know!_ you were so right, dude, I have no idea where I’d be without your support,” he says, and the grin in his voice is vivid and colourful. “You think if it goes full bloom by the postseason we win the cup?” 

“Maybe,” Jake says, quiet, but he likes the thought of it. “A real good luck charm.” 

“Yeah,” Charlie agrees. “Maybe.”

 

 

Jake tells him the dandelion story one day, and Charlie says, “well then, you want Mari for a bit?” 

“What do you mean?” Jake asks, like it isn’t obvious what’s being offered. 

Charlie shrugs, nudges his shoulder. “My room’s probably getting stuffy, we can switch off if you want. I can bring it over.” 

Jake flattens his lips into a thin line. “I don’t even know the first thing about flowers. I don’t know if you were listening, but the dandelion dies at the end.” 

“No, but, this isn’t a dandelion. It’s a marigold. I know you’d be good at this whole thing if you try, it’s not difficult,” Charlie explains slowly, like he’s breaking apart a play on the ice. “You just give it water, sunshine, and minerals. I’ll show you.” 

Jake stares at him, hesitant. “You’re sure.” 

“So sure.” 

He nods. “Okay, yeah. Let’s do that.” 

 

 

Next thing he knows, Charlie unloads a fucking schedule onto him. How much sun to give Mari, the exact amount of water, the tiny portion of granular fertilizer, everything precise down to a tee. And obviously, Jake really doesn’t want to kill it, not after the amount of love he’s seen poured into caring for it. He doesn’t think he could handle it if he screwed up that bad. So, he follows the instructions.

“If you have any questions, you know you can just ask. Don’t try acting like a know-it-all,” Charlie tells him, stern, and Jake wants to protest, but he already knows full well what Charlie’s going to say.

You get lost in downtown Boston refusing to ask for directions _once_ and suddenly it’s all you’re known for. 

“You want me to read bedtime stories to it, too?” Jake says, and he’s mostly joking, but Charlie looks at him like he isn’t anywhere near uncharted territory. 

“I mean, I’m not stopping you.”

 

 

The splash of yellow blends in with the rest of his room well. It’d gotten too monochrome with the abundance of white Ikea furniture, too bland, too empty. Somehow, it’s like having a piece of sunshine in his room, a piece of Charlie.

And. It’s a nice feeling. 

 

 

Charlie says, “we technically have joint custody of a flower,” and he’s smiling and smiling. 

“Technically,” Jake agrees. “Even if you’re the one who raised it from a seed.” 

“You paid child support in the form of love and affection.” 

Jake rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t disagree. 

 

 

They really do start taking turns, on and off with Mari. Jake gets it one week, Charlie gets it the next, it’s a lot easier alternating once the summer rolls around. Because they’re either somewhere within a few miles of each other, or exclusively hanging out. 

Like when Charlie’s lying upside down on Jake’s bed, that thin ray of sunlight that’s peeking in through the blinds hitting his jaw, and Mari’s right in there with them. It looks happy, healthy, at home. 

Jake didn’t think he’d ever start to care about a plant like he would for a pet, but it’s a good luck charm at this point. And he could say it’s all because of superstition, but the fact that Charlie loves it might play a big role in his affection. 

“Say you could do anything else in the world,” Charlie starts, and he sits up to look at him. He’s all rosy skin and this shy curve in his lips. Jake follows the shape of his mouth with his eyes. “Other than play a sport, what would you do.” 

Jake wants to say, “it doesn’t matter as long as it’s with you.” He doesn’t, because he’s got the self control to bite his tongue when he has to. 

He does end up looking away. 

“I dunno,” he says honestly. “Cook? How sick would working at some big fancy restaurant be.” 

Charlie smiles and Jake sees it reach his eyes. “Think I’d wanna open a flower shop, maybe. Get a greenhouse, y’know.” 

“You could get a greenhouse anyways,” Jake says.

“Nah.” He waves a hand dismissively. “Right now? I’d suck at that.”

Jake’s fingers brush the exposed skin at Charlie’s ankle. He doesn’t pull back. “No you wouldn’t,” he says, but he doesn’t explain it. “I know you wouldn’t.”

Charlie asks, “you’d help out?”

“I mean, yeah.” Jake still shrugs, like it’s something he’s unsure about. It isn’t, not really. “Always.” 

 

 

The one evening Jake decides to collect rainwater, it drizzles. It’s a light sprinkle, and the rays of the dipping sunlight hit the mason jar he has sitting out on his front steps. 

It’s not a big blowout game this time. A 3-2 win, but a win nonetheless, and when he snaps Charlie a photo of the clear water, Charlie snaps one back of a smiling sun sticker and Mari. 

In the caption box it only says _come over!!_ but it’s not like Jake ever needed any convincing.

 

 

It’s Charlie’s turn with Mari this week. 

Jake gets a call while he’s getting ready for bed and he’s almost immediately prepared for him to gush about how Mari’s magically grown an inch, or how he found this quality brand of fertilizer on Amazon, or whatever it is he’s excited about this time.

But that’s—not it. 

The line is radio silent for long enough that Jake thinks this is a pocket dial. He offers a, “hey, buddy,” and then, “you there?” It’s still nothing.

Eventually, Charlie speaks. After what feels like forever. “Hey, I,” he pauses. Jake hears him suck in a little breath. “I just dropped Mari.” 

“Wait, what?” 

Over the line, he hears a drawer shutting. “It was dark. I wanted to move it back to the window sill because I had it sitting on my nightstand and I just.” 

Charlie sounds seriously hurt, it’s in the way his voice sounds cracked open. The unease lying beneath it. Jake feels this heavy guilt in his chest, weighing down and down and he doesn’t even know _why_. 

“Hey, hey, it’s not your fault, okay?” Jake tries, and he keeps his words as soft as he can. Even if he knows just how toneless each syllable may sound through the phone. “It’s gonna be alright, did you put it back in its pot?” 

“I repotted it, yeah, whole new pot. I tried my best I just don’t know if it’s enough. It doesn’t look dead, but I don’t _know_ what a dead plant looks like,” Charlie says. “I don’t wanna know.” 

Jake picks at an imaginary piece of lint on his sweats. He blows out a breath. “I can come over. You want me to come over?” 

“Yes,” Charlie answers, “please.”

 

 

When he’s leading Jake to his room, Charlie says, “I googled it, but I don’t trust google because it told me I suck at everything.”

“Google’s overrated,” Jake says. “The worst that could’ve happened is. I dunno, stunted growth, maybe. It’s like a broken leg.” 

Charlie pushes open the door and Mari’s sitting there on the window sill, peaceful as ever. You’d never be able to tell anything went down, if it weren’t for the semi-terrified look still on Charlie’s face.

“That sounds awful,” he says. “Look, just—look. Does it look dead? Did I fuck this up?” 

Jake thinks he knows what a dead flower looks like. Wilted leaves, drooping petals, vivid colours turned dull and withered. This isn’t that. 

It could be. In two, three days, but he doesn’t know it. He can’t say for sure.

What he does say is, “I think it’s okay.” Because it’s all he can really assure him of for now. It’s the most he can do. 

Charlie nods, slow, and leans into his side gingerly enough that Jake barely feels the brush of a shoulder against his. His eyes are focused on Mari, and Jake’s watching him. Waiting. 

“Are you staying?” Charlie asks instead, and tilts his chin up just slightly from where it’d been dropped. It doesn’t sound like an offer. 

“I don’t know. Would you want that?” 

“Yeah,” Charlie says, he sounds timid. “I would.”

Jake nods. He keeps the motion tight, just enough that he hopes it’s understanding. “Then I’m staying.”

 

 

Mari’s still okay in the morning. Later that afternoon. And in the evening as well. 

They spend the entire day hanging around doing nothing. Charlie orders in for lunch and dinner, even if Jake insists he can make something of the assorted shit in Charlie’s fridge.

They check in on Mari once in a while. Charlie’s disappointed every time.

“It hasn’t grown,” he complains, some time past sunset, and Jake huffs. 

“Its barely been a day.” 

Charlie looks between Jake and Mari, still unimpressed. “Twenty four hours is twenty four hours” 

“C’mon, what happened to positive energy? A kind environment for good growth, yeah?” Jake sits at the edge of Charlie’s bed, the side facing the window sill, and he waits patiently for Charlie for follow. Even goes as far as to pat down the spot next to him. “Take a breather.”

“You’re right,” he agrees, even if he sounds stubborn. “I’m overreacting. It’s stupid.” 

When the bed weighs down next to him, Jake feels grounded. He breathes, careful. Like making something as simple as a sudden movement could kill the moment.

“It’s not stupid, don’t say that.”

Charlie meets his eyes with something incoherent, this soft look drawn all across his face, and he just says, “oh. You—“ It’s nothing more than a breath. 

Their thighs are pressed in close. Jake doesn’t shift. He doesn’t know what that means. 

Still, he nods, and he isn’t sure what he goes to add to that, if he’s going to tell Charlie everything will be fine or if he’s going to try something else. What he does know is that it dies in his throat a second later. 

When Charlie touches a hand to his shoulder and drops his eyes to his mouth, and asks, “is this okay?” close enough that Jake can feel his breath on his skin.

It’s not hard to tell what he’s asking. It’s just hard to function afterwards.

Jake, because he’s working with nothing more than the way his heart jumps into his throat, answers, “okay.”

It’s a quick kiss. 

Short and dry, but just long enough for Jake to give in to the slide of Charlie’s mouth against his. It’s enough that he can feel warmth dust over his face and set his skin ablaze. It’s enough that he feels dizzy by the time Charlie pulls back and smiles. It’s enough. 

“I don’t know why that took me so long,” Charlie says, still hovering in close. His hand is warm on the side of Jake’s neck, fingers curled in behind his ear.

“We have an actual plant together,” Jake provides helpfully. 

Charlie‘s laugh is bright. “Oh my god. We do.”

 

 

Mari’s growth is tangible two weeks later, and Charlie looks like he’s going to cry when Jake tells him. 

“So you’re the good luck charm. You’ve been good luck all along,” Charlie says, and winds him in for a hug so tight that Jake swears half his life flashes before his eyes.

“Yeah, right.” He shakes his head, but he stays smiling anyways. “We’re just really good at this. Green thumbs”

“Four green thumbs,” Charlie agrees. 

“And hey, foolproof way to avoid dropping potted plants, wanna know my secret?” Jake asks, and Charlie looks immediately intrigued.

“Spill.”

“We plant a garden,” he says.

“Wait,” Charlie says, his eyes wide. “You’re not kidding?” 

Jake raises his eyebrows. He tries looking as sincere as he can. “Is this my kidding face?” 

“I’m serious. Don’t fuck around about this, I swear.” 

Jake’s heart feels like it’s on the brink of leaping right out of his chest. “I wouldn’t joke about this. You know that.”

“Okay,” Charlie says. He nods, quick up and down. “I want that. A garden, we should do that.” 

Jake grins. When Charlie leans in to kiss his smile, he asks, “we’re gonna do this?” The words get swallowed up in the press of their lips, but the way Charlie laughs into his mouth is enough of an answer.

Yeah, they’re planting a garden if it’s the last thing they do.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] What Falls From the Skies](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19585897) by [Annapods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annapods/pseuds/Annapods)




End file.
